Convicted murderer mistakenly released in Cook County

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A simple mistake has a dangerous killer on the run in Chicagoland.

44-year-old Steven L Robbins was convicted of a 2002 murder in Indianapolis and was supposed to serve his sentence in a maximum-security prison in Indiana until 2029.

Robbins was shipped to Chicago for a circuit court hearing on two drug charges on Tuesday. The charges were dropped and when they were, instead of being returned to Indiana to serve the rest of his 50 year sentence for murder, Cook County officials let him go.

“I can’t answer why he was released in the Chicago area. I don’t know. All I know is that inadvertently he was released from jail without being returned to Indiana,” said the Indiana Department of Corrections.

Robbins is 44, African-American, 5 feet 5 inches tall with a very distinctive tattoo on the right side of his neck that says “Nicole.”

Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart has ordered an investigation into how this happened, but so far tonight there has not been a lot of information from the sheriff’s office.

Anyone with information is asked to contact police at 708-865-4915 or dial 911.